2008 — 26 April: Saturday
Another day, another walk. We're chasing after a different Bluebell Hill. My companion bluebell hunter, by the way, being also the Blu Ray fiend, has indeed been able to track down a magic little box to convert a component signal into RGBHV for his projection CRT system. He's almost too Keene to get it! Meanwhile, last night's dreadful "Trivia" results are mercifully fading. 52% — pah! And I've been able to offload one of my surplus DVD players to a more deserving household, so that's good, too.
Gotta dash; lunch to be packed and lifts to be given. Before which I need some sleep, and some further crock-potting prep. It's 00:09, but I'm going to have to switch Mark Lamarr's excellent programme off, alas.
Farewell, "Humph"
At age 86, and after presenting Best of Jazz for 40 years. A good innings, I guess. In his own wonderful words: "Well as the vanquished charwoman of time begins to shake-n-vac the shagpile of eternity, I've noticed that we've just run out of time..." He refused a knighthood in 1995. Nice man.
Well, here's a change...
I'm up and staggering about early enough to have finished the crock pot prep by the 8 o'clock news. So I get to hear the entire Brian Matthew music show now, while pondering brekkie and packed lunch. The down side is that I also listened to the tosh that precedes this (and I don't just mean the news). Today's crockpottery is a total experiment about which I shall keep quiet until the results are (as it were) in. But I'm prepared to reveal the use of both fresh mint and an entire parsnip, among other things. I expect I will be able to judge the results purely nasally as soon as I get home later today.
Recalling yesterday's lunchtime pint, and despite a happy marriage of 33 years to a German lady who occasionally enjoyed a splash of the stuff, I remained blissfully unaware of the Reinheitsgebot let alone the quotation attributed to Ben Franklin about beer:
"Proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy."
Bavaria (typical!) insisted on national acceptance of the Reinheitsgebot as a precondition for German unification under Otto von Bismarck in 1871. This spelled the extinction of northern German spiced and cherry beers, but it marked the emergence of a nationwide standard for beer.
Dem bones...
I think one of the more dangerous phrases around these days could be "A little research on the Internet...". There's a long, carefully-written, example here but it makes me wonder how well any such investigation's mass media reporting would withstand such careful and detailed scrutiny. Not well, I suspect. But the logical conclusion is that you can only trust the evidence of your own direct experience.
Big Bro's toy
As I chew the raspberries I like to lighten up my morning concrete and cardboard cereal with, I'm fairly sure I've seen Big Bro fiddling with a Blackberry in the past. Here's an interesting piece by David Fielding about Mike Lazaridis and what he's up to now.
Bluebells galore
Time (09:11) to go pack that lunch ready for the great outdoors. Frankly, I'm hoping for better results than this from yesterday:
Sadly, the photographic muse doesn't always turn up on demand. Back after nearly seven miles round and about Ellisfield, but with an uninspired set of photos to show for it. Here's just one:
It's a MAD world
Somewhen in the 1966 / 1967 timeframe I took part in the Duke of Edinburgh's award scheme, joining the Civil Defence "Rescue" Corps, donning an extremely uncool brown uniform, and learning how to knock holes in brick walls prior to manoeuvring people strapped to stretchers through the resulting gaps. (Plus they had a bar in the social club that permitted us young chaps the occasional glass of cider after such thirsty work.) I also learned about the "bomb", the effects of blast, heat, and radiation damage, the concept of the "LD50" (the lethal dose to see off half a given population), the use of a portable radiation dosimeter, and all about the perfectly-named concept of MAD1 (mutual assured destruction). A rich mixture of memories triggered by the fascinating piece here.
You hafta laugh... dept.
If you recall my pair of overlooked fresh grapefruit — one has just proved delicious, but its little mate had collapsed to about two-thirds of its original size and was enveloped by a totally fascinating fine grey-green mould. Bang goes the next penicillin, I suppose. Still, at least the vapours emanating from the crockpot are entirely benign (and quite enticing). Fingers crossed. It's 18:08 and the tum is starting to rumble a tad.
I'm now listening to the rather poignant tapes made by Miles Kington shortly before he died back in January. This is after a busy evening, hacking off chunks of hair more or less by feel (I have to take my glasses off and am then interestingly myopic), having a bath, loading the washing machine, and then assessing the results of the day's crockpot experiment. It was very tasty and (I hope) nutritious, so I shall reveal the contents (like Ratty in The wind in the willows): diced pork, diced lamb, fresh chopped mint, one sliced onion, one sliced parsnip, several sliced potatoes, even more carrots, a few dabs of flour, about a pint (I'm guessing) of lamb stock and pork stock mixed together, a complete peeled, sliced Bramley apple, (a can of) chopped tomatoes and garlic in olive oil, and a splosh or two of red cooking wine. All simmered amiably together since about 9 o'clock this morning until an hour ago. The only thing puzzling me is where did the parsnip disappear to? (Same place as the apple, I suppose.)
The music of Time keeps dancing along. I still haven't decided whether I like this latest dramatisation. It all seems increasingly remote, even as it's reaching the start of World War II. I think I prefer Waugh's Sword of Honour trilogy though I haven't re-read that since Christa and I "enjoyed" a simultaneous attack of double pneumonia2 in February 1991. I remember laughing out loud at the incident of Apthorpe's "Thunder-box", but I was very feverish (104 F) at the time.